Bad news travels fast. Even faster online.
Viral (a novel exploring the perils of high-speed human connectivity) opens with a jolt:
‘I sucked twelve cocks in Magaluf.
So far, twenty-three thousand and ninety-six people have seen me do this.’
In a post-OnlyFans era, the reader might wonder whether this is a brag.
Spoiler – it isn’t.
‘A month ago, when Su was still seventeen, it would have been illegal to post images or content of a sexual nature. Not now, though, she’s an adult. As for the person who uploaded it in Magaluf, or anyone sharing it abroad, I’m afraid we can’t do anything about that, probably couldn’t even if it was here in the UK. You must know there’s no offence here […] just an unfortunate case of involuntary pornography.’
Su is a hardworking, intelligent, kind, and principled young woman, just turned eighteen and about to embark on a career at medical school. She has everything to live for, and her life seems sorted.
But Su, like every other human being is complex. She was adopted as a baby and, after initially bonding with her sister Leah (born less than a year after the adoption went through), Su has spent the past eight years trying to re-bond, with a Leah who suddenly rejected her straight-laced “Chinky” sister.
Su’s parents order their sensible oldest daughter to attend a trip to Magaluf with Leah, concerned that their younger daughter is supervised whilst on a girls’ holiday. It’s the only way they will allow the holiday to go ahead, much to Leah’s embarrassment. Su has no say in the matter.
Leah gives Su strict orders as to how to behave on holiday, going so far as to provide Su with dancing, drinking and Magaluf etiquette lessons before they depart. Su is banned from healthy eating, soft drinks and basically anything that could threaten Leah’s coolgirl image.
Desperate for her sister’s approval, Su agrees.
And that’s where things begin to go wrong. Seriously wrong, in fact.
Following several nights of partying, Su, Leah, Millie and Natasha (Leah’s friends) attend a nightclub, with the agenda being that Su will lose her virginity.
Several free cocktails, and an MDMA-spiked drink later, Su ends up on the dancefloor, surrounded by twelve men, and their genitals.
Someone called Xano, who refers to himself as a film director on social media (The!Next!Stanley!) is filming as events unravel, providing commentary and referring to Su in terms that will come to haunt her and her family as much as the video itself.
Su’s parents, Ruth Oliphant and Bernie Loveridge, are oblivious to their daughter’s antics.
Ruth is a High Court Sheriff, Bernie a musician at the Conservatoire. Their oblivion is soon shattered as the video reaches them via the Internet. In fact, the video reaches pretty much everyone and everywhere, including Edinburgh University who decide that they can no longer accept Su as a student, given the bad reputation that precedes her.
‘…the Mail Online has discovered something new: Edinburgh University has withdrawn Su Oliphant-Brotheridge’s offer to study Medicine, an anonymous source revealed today.’
‘So I’m not going to Edinburgh University. I rejected offers from Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow and St Andrews, but I suppose they wouldn’t have me now either. I’m not going to study Medicine. I’m not going to be a doctor. I’ve wanted to be a doctor since I was three. Mum says I set up a play surgery at that age, and have talked of nothing since. I’ve dedicated myself to the notion. I’ve wanted it and expected it.’
Ruth, never blameful of her daughter, and certain that something awful must have happened, tries her best to gain control over an increasingly uncontainable situation.
‘Ruth put the phone and the mug down. She grabbed the whisky, drank it in one, and turned to a still-pacing Bernard. ‘Get on your computer and report every site that’s hosting the video.’
”How do you—‘
Sheriff Ruth Oliphant was the only one around here who was allowed to interrupt. ‘I don’t know! Jesus, Bernard, find out, and do it, and don’t stop doing it till it’s gone.’
An interesting backstory unravels as we learn that Ruth was subject to the scrutiny of social services when Su was a baby, not just because she was adopting Su, but because of a terrible mistake she herself made one frantic afternoon. She actually lost custody of Su for the best part of a year.
‘Blame hadn’t always played a central role in Ruth’s life. She blamed right-on social workers for its entrance to centre stage. And she blamed criminal law for keeping it there. That’s the job, after all. Find out who’s at fault, and punish.’
In the wake of Su’s Magaluf scandal, Ruth is met with blame in a different format; she is forced to step down from her job, with her position in court becoming untenable. Her subjects begin to mock her. Ruth is no longer able to command respect.
But her job is the least of her worries.
A sudden death, triggering memories of social services involvement, and the realization that she lacks a bond with her youngest daughter, Leah, sets Ruth on a dark and risky trajectory.
‘Front door closed. Ruth realised this was nothing like her father’s death. Her daughter was missing, not dead. The incident was ongoing, not over. Over twenty thousand views now? Yes, well over that. There were no flowers on the doorstep, no calls on the answerphone and no one would come by with casseroles.’
As the novel unfolds the video gains more and more traction, and a suicidal Su decides she is unable to return to Scotland.
‘My plan is to hide away until another video goes viral. It’ll need to be good, like the 2013 triumph involving the branch. In that particular video, a teenage boy was recording his friend with his phone. In the background, the friend’s dad was using his new birthday present, a chainsaw, to chop off a tree branch that was getting too close to their house. The boy’s mother was holding the ladder steady, but not very well, because the man lost balance, holding his precious chainsaw as he fell, and decapitating his wife en route. That’s the kind of Oscar-winning stuff that’s out there.’
Ruth, with her judge’s hat on, investigates whether a crime has even been committed, what facts can be established, and whether it’s wise to try and take the law into her own hands…
As for Su, she feels increasingly alone and ‘other’, in a world where Internet is God, and the congregation are determined to crucify her in every way imaginable.
‘I’m dizzy. I might faint. I should lower my head, let the blood reach it. But I can’t take my eyes off the screen. I refresh my Google search again.’
‘#shagaluf is trending worldwide on Twitter.’
‘If you type the word slut into Google, I am the first news item to appear. I honestly didn’t know that the word slut was an okay one to say out loud, or to write online […] There you have it, slut slut slut. People feel they are doing a necessary and just thing, which they call slutshaming (its hashtag is trending in Scotland). I am on a wooden platform in the town square. My head and arms are in the pillory. And the people are throwing tweets at me.’
‘A feeble few tweet for mercy: Why is she the slut? What about the men? But they are drowned out.’
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